Eh, most of the time in the vanilla version of 11 he lost too, at least in my games, I saw him win like once or twice but.... I haven't ever seen him lose to Liu Yu though.....well not on his own. I saw once Gongsun Zan send his army against Yuan Shao and it got destroyed then Liu Yu moved in and conquered him, but I never saw that again Usually Liu Yu is the first of the three up there to go, perhaps Gongsun Gong beating him out.

"If you can't drink a lobbyist's whiskey, take his money, sleep with his women and still vote against him in the morning, you don't belong in politics."

LiuBeiwasGreat wrote:Eh, most of the time in the vanilla version of 11 he lost too, at least in my games, I saw him win like once or twice but.... I haven't ever seen him lose to Liu Yu though.....well not on his own. I saw once Gongsun Zan send his army against Yuan Shao and it got destroyed then Liu Yu moved in and conquered him, but I never saw that again Usually Liu Yu is the first of the three up there to go, perhaps Gongsun Gong beating him out.

All I know is playing XIII I've had two "Liu Yu captured Bei Ping---Gongsun Zan destroyed" messages, and one from Gongsun Du.

That is impressive, though the last couple of playthroughs I did I gave all of the smaller forces each at least one created officer so I think I am throwing things off. The next time I play I won't change anything.

What difficulty are you playing?

"If you can't drink a lobbyist's whiskey, take his money, sleep with his women and still vote against him in the morning, you don't belong in politics."

LiuBeiwasGreat wrote:That is impressive, though the last couple of playthroughs I did I gave all of the smaller forces each at least one created officer so I think I am throwing things off. The next time I play I won't change anything.

What difficulty are you playing?

They were on different ones. My first game I forgot to change it so it was on easy, after that I think it's been on Hard.

The Gongsuns and Liu Yu all have no force trend coded in and Yuan Shao won't touch that area with events on until a certain point, so they tend to cannibalize each other. I've seen all three come out on top. But Zan's force was kind of OP in XI, all his officers had White Riders, the force had that tech I think, and his AI was surprisingly tenacious.

He is back to being a puppy dog in relative terms in this one.

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I wrapped up my Cao Cao YT events run. Wow that was a slow game. Borrowing Arrows wouldn't fire so I said &×"* it and cleaned house.

Started again as Cao Cao in YT but with events off and trying to "recreate" his rise to power if possible. Was planning to rebel after befriending everyone but if He Jin conquers fast despite my foot dragging, I may just roll with that. Should be a faster game either way.

Edit: The Turbans force is really terrible in this, there was exactly *one* desperate battle - that being the very first one for Ye - but I pulled through and broke down the force front door. Ding Yuan even took a city haha

Well I was trying to bring He Jin's momentum to a halt but even with me swiping his officers and sticking them in my viceroy lands as fast as I can, he is still managing to expand rapidly enough that his victory is inevitable. I originally was reluctant about expanding my domain, but at some point I couldn't afford all the high-stipend officers I was getting, so I started working on Dong Zhuo out in Yi. But I doubt that I can stake enough of a claim to really dominate He Jin because he has better cities.

While He Jin has many cities now with a lone officer due to my efforts, his borders still generally have around 5 or so, and he broke Sun Jian with some early battles that cost him all of his food.

Anyway, if you want to get more officers for your domain when viceroy, one way to do it is to form bonds with other officers on your force. I found that a level 1 bond will usually suffice, but I did have to get Dong Cheng up to level 2 for whatever reason to get He Jin to agree to the transfer proposal. If you have good enough presence, that should trigger plenty of respect statuses that make forming bonds easier. It should work on most ministers and even governors, although I'm not so sure about the ruler's ministers.

I took out Ma Teng - that was amusing because he attacked the AI-held Anding, I countered from Tianshui by attacking Jincheng and Wuwei, and Ma Teng waited until it was far too late to abandon his assault for the Wuwei defense so it fell without a fight - and the only thing keeping Dong Zhuo propped up is the immense distances to travel between cities out west. The only real threat is Gongsun Zan so I'm probably going to stop dragging my feet, accept He Jin's ascension to the throne, and help him conquer the country. The surreptitious rebellion is cool in theory, but you really have to be quite fast to keep He Jin from steamrolling the map. I may give it a half-hearted attempt, though...

My thoughts on this scenario with events off, if you are serving He Jin, you will not really experience any difficulties. If you are an officer on another force, he's probably a more dangerous blob than Dong due to his talent pool. I intend to play Liu Bei and Sun Jian with events off, these will be much more challenging - especially as Liu Bei since he's not even a ruler yet.

Oh, and one other thing. I could have sworn I set this game to extended lifespans, but the illness guys are dying right on time. Will have to confirm later. Unnatural deaths get roughly 20 years even with normal lifespans, I thought the 9 in XI was bad but you get some of those YT dudes living until 206 which is a bit weird.

Zyzyfer wrote:Oh, and one other thing. I could have sworn I set this game to extended lifespans, but the illness guys are dying right on time. Will have to confirm later. Unnatural deaths get roughly 20 years even with normal lifespans, I thought the 9 in XI was bad but you get some of those YT dudes living until 206 which is a bit weird.

I suspect extended lifespan only effects the character you're playing as, since I've consistently had people dying of illness with that setting on.

Zyzyfer wrote:Oh, and one other thing. I could have sworn I set this game to extended lifespans, but the illness guys are dying right on time. Will have to confirm later. Unnatural deaths get roughly 20 years even with normal lifespans, I thought the 9 in XI was bad but you get some of those YT dudes living until 206 which is a bit weird.

I suspect extended lifespan only effects the character you're playing as, since I've consistently had people dying of illness with that setting on.